Amazon Appstore briefly appears online

by3/18/2011 10:36:00 AM

3/18/2011 10:36:00 AM

As we mentioned earlier this week, the Amazon Appstore is all set to launch on or before 22nd March, when it will showcase the Angry Birds Rio game as an exclusive, as well as some so-far-unknown other apps. Unknown until a page leaked, that is.

Android News accidentally encountered a stray page on the Amazon site, a page that's now been hastily removed. Not before that site screengrabbed it though. 48 apps were shown on the page, including Zenonia, Raging Thunder II, SetCPU, The Moron Test and SwiftKey. It doesn't tell us a great deal right now, except perhaps details of some of the developers taking part in Amazon's store. But it does offer a glimpse into Amazon's strategy, which is likely to be driven by price.

It makes sense. After all, why would you drag yourself to another site away from the Android Market without good reason? As an example, the big-selling retro camera app Vignette sells for $4.02 (£2.40) in the Android Market, but if you go to the Amazon site, you'll be looking at a price of $2.99 (£1.80). That's a considerable markdown - 25 per cent of a markdown.

Admittedly, this could just be a test page and those prices could be false. But so close to next week's launch, we doubt it. if you own an Android device and want to save some cash, it's already looking like a winner.